Facebook Leads Revenue Per Visit but Tumblr is Number 2

Hear that? That’s the sound of a massive Tumblr rolling right at you. While you’ve been busy with Pinterest and Instagram, this beast has been slowly gathering mass and and now it’s too big to ignore.

According to Adobe’s just released Q4 2013 Social Media Intelligence Report, Tumblr’s RPV (Revenue Per Visit) rose 340% year-over-year making it the fastest growing network. But the real proof is in the dollars.

Let me clarify some of these numbers for you. Blue bars are Q4 2013, gray bar is Q4 2012. On the left we have Facebook rising from $0.71 to $1.22 (72% growth). On the far right we have Tumblr jumping from $0.25 to $1.10.

Twitter and Pinterest both come in under $1 RVP but they both showed impressive growth – 244% for Pinterest, 131% for Twitter.

Facebook’s growth of only 72% is an interesting sign. Sure, they’ve got the highest dollar figure right now but are they pretty much maxed out? Unless something changes drastically in the next year, Tumblr and Pinterest could be topping Facebook by Q4 2014. How weird would that be?

Here’s another sign of trouble. Though a clear leader in social referrals, Facebook lost ground this past year while Pinterest and Twitter showed gains.

The problem is simple, once everyone in the world already uses your service, there’s no room to go anywhere but down. Their only hope is to open a kids division for the 0-13 crowd. Kids have more discretionary income than your average adult, right. . . ?

First thing I see here is that it wasn’t my imagination, people on Facebook aren’t clicking “like” as often as they used to. I think that’s “like” fatigue. That button is on every article, photo and video all over the web and people just don’t see it or care enough to us it anymore.

The report also states clearly that photo posts are the only types people are responding to. Engagement rates on text, links, even video posts have decreased.

What I take away from this is that when it comes to social media, people don’t want to work for it. They don’t want to read or take the time to watch a video. They want to see an image and make a decision – click to own it or keep scrolling for more. That makes me sad.

How about you? Are you willing to go all image all the time if that’s what it takes?